By the Advocate Editorial Board
March 3, 2011 at 5:04 p.m.Updated March 2, 2011 at 9:03 p.m.

It appears that the University of Houston-Victoria continues to grow its freshman and sophomore classes since adding those levels for the first time last year.

As of Thursday morning, UHV received 1,315 freshmen applications for fall registration compared to 377 the same time last year. And, so far, UHV has accepted 392 freshman from those applications, according to Chari Norgard, UHV associate vice president for student affairs.

This is a significant increase. We do understand that not all of the applicants will attend UHV, but more than likely the number attending will be a substantial increase on campus, as well.

Certainly, this continued increase in the number of UHV freshmen applications shows that UHV will achieve its goal of becoming a destination university.

Margaret Rice, UHV chief of staff, noted that many of the students who have applied like the campus because of the low tuition and Victoria's small-town appeal, as well as its location and its juxtaposition to larger cities, such as Houston, Austin, San Antonio and Corpus Christi.

But we want to praise those who are behind the scenes in this increased awareness of UHV, and those are the recruiters who have worked so hard to bring students here.

Only about 8 percent of the new applicants come from areas where no recruitment was initiated. That is a good indication of how hard our recruiters have worked.

"Thirty-seven percent of the current class is from Houston, and that percentage seems likely to remain large, given the size of the population and UHV's brand recognition there, but applications come from around the state, even as far away as El Paso, and some from out of state. Though not all students accepted actually enroll, we do look forward to meeting or exceeding our enrollment targets for the coming year," said Don Smith, UHV Interim President.

And Denee Thomas, senior director for enrollment management, said, "...UHV recruiters have made or attended more than 450 campus visits, college fairs, college-awareness presentations and counselor visits. Our efforts are bringing more applications, and more completed applications, from all of our target areas - Houston area, San Antonio area, Corpus Christi area, Laredo area and South Texas Rio Grande Valley area."

Again, we congratulate the recruiters for their hard, successful work. UHV will surely be continuing its growth with such an effort.

"Parents, students and counselors are responding to the message that Victoria is a good alternative to large cities, and that for some students, a small campus that can give personalized attention to students is a perfect fit," Thomas added.

We couldn't have said it better.

This editorial reflects the views of the Victoria Advocate's editorial board.